My friend Chris from Cat Adoption Team used to say, “Kittens will break your heart,” and I thought she meant when they died unexpectedly. This week I know better. They break your heart with everything they do. The cute, the playful, the winsome and the mischievous things they do. I also find they break my heart with the ways their relationships with foster parents show. Here is today’s story:So you know, I am like a social worker for the kittens and cats. I arrange for them to come to our adoption center, to be cared for by a team of volunteers and the store staff, until they are adopted. So, today we a kitten delivered to our adoption center at the pet store by a senior lady who’d had him since he was one week old. The kitten’s name is ‘Homer,’ and he was actually picked up and rescued by a DOG who carried the kitten to his home. I can just imagine the scene in that dog’s home....oh my. ANYway, Harriet was called on to bottle feed Homer and raise him to an adoptable age, which she did. He is a beautiful, sweet and playful silvery gray tabby kitten. After I had put Homer into the cat condo with two other kittens of similar size and age, Harriet handed me a paper bag. I opened it, and there were several toys she said were ‘Homer’s favorites,’ a small bag of dry food and a can of gourmet cat food. I put the dry food and the toys into the kennel for Homer and his new friends, and I told Harriet the kittens would have some canned food in the evening. She and I filled out his medical history paperwork, and she said goodbye to him and to me and left the store. Thank goodness I hadn’t turned the bag around until after she left. On the back of the bag, in big block letters, she had printed Homer’s name. That detail in her care of him, as it showed the obvious relationship between them, sent me into a fit of tears. Harriet so obviously cared for Homer and loved him completely in the two months they were together. . Tonight he is spending his first and only night away from home, with his new kitten friends. Tomorrow he will be adopted into a new home. He will join a young businessman who has a cat just about a year old that would like a playmate. I will put his toys and a can of food back into the bag for Homer’s Dad to take home with them..